Psyker Landshark

Qlippoth Shift: A Supernatural Action RP About Combating Otherworldy Anomalies

Zhao Jinhai

The onna-bushi went down, and the samurai...up and packed it in. Damn. Looked like seeing everyone else go down shocked him back into sanity. Good for everyone, bad for Jinhai's own entertainment. With a sigh, he walked over towards the odachi he'd tossed aside, kicked it up into the air with his foot, and snatched it by the hilt with his hand before resting the blade on his shoulder.

The former monk walked over towards the kneeling samurai, squatting down on his heels next to him.

"Yeah, well, trained monk here. Pretty sure I could get an exorcism going, don't think buddy over here's in any mood to keep on going, even as a local god." He said over in Sakura's direction before turning back to the warrior.

"That said, you wanna go out with honor, I know you're implying harakiri isn't working, but what if you had a second?" He lifted the odachi off his shoulder for a brief moment in emphasis before letting it rest again. "Could be what you're missing to let yourself pass on. Give it a thought, huh?"

SPIRITUM

Kalina Kovalic

"Acknowledged. Moving to comply." Two of these automatons had been enough of a hassle to deal with, even half-scrapped as they were. Another six? They might actually take casualties against those odds. Kalina disengaged in good order, reloading her gunblade's chamber as she ran. Her magic kicked in as she sprinted, pulling ahead of the pack.

"Prepping for immediate exfil. I'll have the truck warmed up by the time you arrive, boss." She stated cooly to Justice over Gerard's squad comms.

Kalina made it to the truck ahead of the others, popping the door open and jamming the key into the ignition, twisting. The engine rumbled to life, and she immediately held the brake while slamming her foot down on the gas. If she couldn't do a donut in a truck, then she didn't deserve her defensive driving certification.

The truck whirled around to point away from the crash site for a quick exit just in time for the rest of Barghest to reach it, Kalina already revving the engine.

"Everyone in. Gonna be a bumpy ride out."

Iris Ascendis

Iraleth Kyrios

Iraleth heard the gunshot before she saw the confrontation. The Inheritor glided down towards the source of the shot, increasing her speed as she saw Hildegunde and Otis under attack from some sort of shadow wolf. With Ciara on her back, her angle of approach was limited. Stopping to let her off was out of the question at the moment, so she'd have to make do.

"Dismount if you can! Otherwise, hold on tight!" Iraleth shouted to the witch on her back, tucking her wings and limbs in to further the speed of her plunge. It wasn't going to be a smooth landing. The paladin grit her teeth beneath her conjured helm, her shield braced out in front of her.

The paladin came in from a nearly-horizontal angle, taking the beast from the side as it tunnel-visioned on Hildegunde. Several hundred pounds of warrior, Ethos-conjured plate, and magical shield rammed straight for the creature's flank at high speed, intent on shattering it with sheer force and velocity.

@Sifr @ERode @Estylwen

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Ranbu no Izayoi

The Mystrel manservant, Renzo, took Rudolf's question as a pertinent time to cut in, pointing out a marked dot on the map, located in the northeast end of the city.

"...Lord Hien is being held within what the Valheimr have creatively dubbed the Eastern Detention Center, here. Before the occupation, it was a local magistrate's office, but the invaders have centralized all administrative measures out of Kugane Castle, our Emperor's residence. All reports say the local garrison has heavily fortified it into a holding cell for particularly dangerous prisoners."

He took ink and brush to the map, drawing two lines between the prison and the castle within the direct center of the city. Both were relatively close to each other, with only a few streets separating the two. But their main commonality was the size of the roads they were taking.

"Should you desire to make an attack on the convoy, these main thoroughfares would be the only passages by which an large escort could pass through freely without their group's size inhibiting them. Of course, that would be without factoring in your attack."

A nod in Eliane's direction as he continued.

"Given the sudden movement of the garrison, we would estimate between half a company to the full hundred could be spared to safeguard the execution without leaving the city watch undermanned. Most likely towards the lower end of that scale."

Renzo drew himself up for a moment before dropping to his knees, bowing his head to both Ciradyl and Izayoi.

"Lady Ciradyl, General Izayoi. Forgive this unworthy one's impertinence, but I must protest this course of action. If we truly had the strength to aid in this venture, our resistance force would not be forced to stay to the shadows. From what the survivors we rescued have said, Lord Hien's soldiers and samurai have already scattered to the winds after he gave himself up to allow them time to flee. Surely we ought to respect his decision and his sacrifice?"

Izayoi turned to her fellow Mystel, scowling.

"I am no longer a general. You will not address me as such. Regardless, any successful uprising within our land requires a face and a leader. My lord Kaien trained his heir well, as I recall. I have full faith in Lord Hien to rally Osprey. Considering that the only known survivor of the imperial family is Valheim's puppet, we have little choice but to rely on one of the daimyo to assume a military regency to lead our people. As I am aware, there are vanishingly few choices left, given that the majority of Osprey's high lords are either dead or have their knees bent in submission."

"Now, does anyone have any other useful suggestions?" She couldn't help but shoot Renzo a brief, irritated glare.

Iris Ascendis

sorry for the delay, been busy securing housing
posting 2nite

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Ranbu no Izayoi

For the moment, Izayoi could content herself with the fact that the majority of the party was in agreement with the idea to rescue Hien, even should their proposals differ. Unity in the goal was most important at the moment. She nodded towards Rudolf and Eve for their support before looking back to Galahad.

"For what it is worth, I meant what I said back at Balmung. I have no desire to command, nor to supplant yours. If you would not have approved, I would have gone off on my lonesone, no matter what. Valheim is my mission. The Blight is yours."

With that said, she turned back towards the rest of her table.

"Final command of the overall situation belongs to Ciradyl, though Galahad retains full control over Kirin's movements." Izayoi said firmly, hoping to head off any debates over jurisdiction before they began. "With that said, I agree with Esben's overall appraisal of the scenario. We lack the numbers ourselves to run an effective distraction without crippling our combat capability for the true operation, and any alert will end our efforts lest we are already underway." She paused as the Mystrel manservant laid a map of Kugane's troop movements and concentrations over the table before continuing.

"I believe that the young master will be under heavy guard at every single point of time between now and the execution. The question remains of when to strike. As I see it, we have three options:"

"One: As Caradoc said, we strike while Lord Hien is still being held in lockup, most likely overnight. Assaulting a static location in the dead of night provides us with clear advantages, but we would also put ourselves at risk of failure being on Valheimr's home ground. They know the prison better than we do at this point."

"Two: We attack while he is being moved. This eliminates the advantage of surety for both sides, but also places us at the mercy of the enemy's timetable and route. Should we desire to take the fight to close quarters, the roofs would have to be secured before we make our move, lest their gunners fire into the street with impunity."

"Three: The execution ground. Frankly, I would consider this only as an option of last resort. Caradoc's assessment is correct. Too many sightlines and their riflemen will already be dug in."

"Regardless of what we select, Ciradyl's division of forces has merit: the infiltration team ought to be in place before the main assault begins, and eliminate targets of opportunity to ease the way for the extraction team in a two-pronged attack. Once the young master is freed, both groups ought to link back up and fight our way to exfiltration. Ciradyl, I trust your people can handle our flight to a safehouse?"

Izayoi planted her hands on the table, her gaze burning as she fell into her element from the war. Though she hadn't quite needed to actually consult anyone for her tactics back then. Just because she'd lost her taste for leadership didn't mean she couldn't still strategize.

"Thoughts? Revisions? Objections? Name them now. Every minute is crucial at this point."

Qlippoth Shift: A Supernatural Action RP About Combating Otherworldy Anomalies

Zhao Jinhai

One problem down. Both, if you included efforts that weren't his own. That just left the samurai and the onna-bushi left. Too bad his fingers were still twitching. He wouldn't be able to hold a sword to full effectiveness like this. So with some reluctance, Jinhai tossed the pilfered odachi aside for the moment, with every intention of retrieving it later. It wasn't technically losing a katana if he brought a replacement back, right?

Agent Zhao cracked his knuckles as he stalked forward, set to get back to work with his bare hands. He surged forward, weaving around and under the splitting lightning arrows as he tried to close the distance. Getting into melee range with the warrior woman would ensure that he didn't take any more fire outside of stray shots, as Jinhai doubted the samurai would risk shooting his only lifeline at this point.

A dive tucked into a roll, and he sprang up to lunge at the onna-bushi, aiming to get in close past the range of her weapon to land some devastating baji strikes against her.

Blades of Iron Roses: An Anime-Inspired Knight RP

Renar Hagen

Frankly, he hadn't expected the Iron Roses to be individually so much stronger than each member of Prince Erion's retinue as they were. It seemed their training had borne fruit after all. But that mattered less in the face of the opposing knights' impeccable squad tactics and coordination. Renar grit his teeth in irritation as his killing blow was blocked by the compatriot of his target, a shield interspersing itself between poleaxe and head seemingly from out of nowhere.

This was fine. He could adjust. His ears caught the various shouts across the battlefield, and Renar stepped back from an arcing slash just in time to briefly keep an eye on the bigger picture. The Talderians were blocking in formation in order to render Gertrude's fireballs useless in direct assault. As a distraction, though...

"To the flanks! Clear the firing line!" Renar shouted to his fellows, backing up to give Gertrude a clear shot between herself and the knights that he, Fionn, Gerard, and Fleuri were facing. "Follow my lead!" He'd be an idiot to just shout his plan in the midst of battle. The other three were all competent enough to get the gist as soon as he would move, anyway.

The moment after Gertrude's fireball would impact against the Talderians' shields, Renar would step in, crouching down to deliver a sweeping strike to the feet of as many knights in the shield wall as his poleaxe could reach. Easy meat for the others to deal with should they trip and fall.

The downside to such a team-focused approach was that it was rendered far less effective with each casualty. In theory, they just had to keep bleeding the proverbial beast until it lost its strength.

@The Otter @HereComesTheSnow @Crimson Paladin

Final Fantasy: Lightseekers

Ranbu no Izayoi

"Urk." Izayoi exhaled reflexively as Ciradyl seemed intent on crushing her midsection. One hand raised up to awkwardly pat the Faye on the back before she saw fit to release her. When Izayoi was finally free to breathe again, she waited for introductions to conclude before nodding to Ciradyl.

"I owe you the courtesy of an explanation, at least." She very much didn't care to repeat her story once again in as so many days, but it would at least serve to explain to the latecomers in the group as well. "This may distress you, but I had every intention of not living through my final stand. No one was as surprised as I to discover my own survival after the fact. There was a village at the base of that mountain. The local doctor discovered me clinging to life and ensured that I did not fail in that venture."

A fortifying sip of bergamot. Gods, how she'd missed this.

"One thing led to another. Isshin and I started a family together. One girl. Suzume. She would have seen her fourth nameday within the next two moons." She let a shuddering breath loose at her next words, her eyes haunted. "Six months ago, Valheimr raided the village. Razed it and slew every inhabitant. I had been up on the mountain collecting herbs for Isshin. By the account of one Captain Reisa, they were evidently searching for me. I as good as killed them all, Ciradyl. Twice over. First by my weakness. I had abandoned the sword that whole time. The second by my absence."

Anything further Izayoi would have said was cut off as her ears twitched, footsteps coming from outside of the room. A second later, a lanky Mystel male clad in servant's garb entered, kneeling briefly before rising to set a tray of sweets and pastries down on the table. That task complete, he moved forward to bow his head before Ciradyl.

"Mistress. I bring tidings as well. The local garrison is mobilizing, and several units have already been spotted moving northward. We may have our opening to infiltrate past their defenses. Perhaps we could finally discover exactly what is going on with the Blight. Moreover..." He paused, hesitating. "Lord Hien's execution date has been announced. Tomorrow morning. The occupiers plan to hang him publically before the palace. The public is invited to watch." The last few words were punctuated with a disgusted sneer, but Izayoi shot to her feet, her eyes wide in alarm.

"Hien?! Hien of the Rijin clan?" She asked Renzo desperately, who only nodded. Izayoi turned to look between Ciradyl and Galahad. "Our mission rates greater import, but..." She sucked in a breath. This was selfish of her, but there was no choice. "I swore an oath. His father was my liege lord, before the Emperor saw fit to raise me in his esteem after the former fell in battle. I failed my lord Kaien once already. I cannot let his son die as well."

Izayoi stared at the dragoon, her expression nearly desperate. She sucked in a breath, and against all her instinct, bowed her head.

"I will go on my lonesome if I must. I am not asking you to jeopardize our mission with this distraction. Solely to grant me leave to fulfill my duty. You are in command. The order is yours."

Iris Ascendis

Iraleth Kyrios

Forest. Help.

The message came loud and clear through Iraleth's Adapa, and she finished glowering at Valen and his cronies long enough to pay attention to it. She frowned. Hurried and terse. Hildegunde might actually be in legitimate danger. If that were the case...

The mental math as to whether or not to intervene didn't take as long as someone else might have expected it to. Yes, she would be abandoning the ceremony. Yes, making her way at all due speed would leave her at a disadvantage for the duel tonight. But none of that mattered compared to saving a life. She'd make for a poor paladin if this was the sort of equation that gave her pause.

Iraleth turned her back on Valen and company, closing her eyes.

"On borrowed wings."

The Inheritor's armor manifested, no doubt to the surprise of those around her. Iraleth didn't care. Her helm fixed its gaze upon Ciara.

"You heard the message. I'm going after her. You have five seconds to hitch a ride, and then I leave, with or without you." No matter Ciara's decision, in exactly five seconds, Iraleth would take off, soaring into the sky on wings of light and making her way towards the forest.

@Estylwen